Air Defense Exercise a Month Before 9/11 Was Based Around Osama Bin Laden Carrying Out an Aerial Attack on Washington

NORAD's Northeast Air Defense Sector (NEADS) held a training exercise just over a month before September 11, 2001, which had some uncanny similarities to the 9/11 attacks. The exercise, called Fertile Rice, was based around the scenario of Osama bin Laden--the man who supposedly ordered the 9/11 attacks--organizing an aerial attack on a high-profile government building in Washington, DC--one of the cities attacked on September 11.

NEADS personnel were scheduled to take part in an exercise on September 11. We therefore need to consider whether the similarities between the scenario for the Fertile Rice exercise and some of the incidents they had to deal with on the morning of September 11 caused them to mistake real-world events for part of the day's exercise and thereby impaired their ability to respond to the 9/11 attacks.

EXERCISE INVOLVED BIN LADEN PLANNING TO ATTACK WASHINGTON WITH A DRONE AIRCRAFT
NEADS, based in Rome, New York, was responsible for monitoring and defending the airspace in which the hijackings occurred on September 11, and was consequently responsible for coordinating the U.S. military's response to the 9/11 attacks. [1] It ran an exercise called Fertile Rice each week. [2] On August 4, 2001--five and a half weeks before 9/11--Fertile Rice was based around the scenario of Osama bin Laden's operatives attacking a target in Washington. [3]

An information sheet on the exercise outlined the details. It stated that the scenario for the exercise involved an "Osama bin Laden threat to [the] U.S." Bin Laden had "reportedly acquired at least one and possibly two" unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs). The UAV he'd obtained was believed to be the Russian-developed "Colibri," which had been modified to be launched off a ship.

Bin Laden's operatives intended to carry out an attack in the next 24 to 36 hours. Although their exact target was unknown, it was believed that they intended to strike a "highly visible U.S. government target" that was probably in the Washington area.

The Colibri they would use to carry out the attack was a propeller-driven drone aircraft designed to perform various military and civilian missions. It was 4.25 meters long, had a wingspan of 5.9 meters, and its maximum speed was 155 miles per hour. It was fitted with sophisticated electronic jamming equipment, as well as equipment for monitoring electronic communications and radar.

The ship transporting the Colibri to the Washington area had left a port in the Middle East and was set to rendezvous with one of the terrorists off the coast of Norfolk, Virginia, on August 4. This person would provide the final targeting information that would be programmed into the Colibri. The ship was believed to be carrying additional military equipment, including shoulder-fired surface-to-air missiles, rocket-propelled grenades, automatic weapons, and plastic explosives.

The Colibri's "weapon payload" was "reportedly some type of fuel-air explosive" that would be "activated with an altimeter device." [4] Fuel-air explosives are highly destructive weapons. They spray an explosive mist and then ignite the vapor, thereby creating a blast far larger than a conventional weapon produces. [5]

The exact form that the Colibri's "weapon payload" would take in the scenario is unstated in the information sheet. It could perhaps have been a fuel-air bomb that the UAV would drop onto its target. Alternatively, the mock terrorists' intention may have been to fly the Colibri into its target such that the fuel-air explosive it carried would detonate on impact.

AUGUST 4 EXERCISE HAD SIMILARITIES TO THE 9/11 ATTACKS
It is worth considering whether the similarities between the scenario for the Fertile Rice exercise on August 4 and some of the incidents NEADS had to deal with on September 11 had a detrimental effect on how NEADS personnel responded to the 9/11 attacks.

NEADS personnel are known to have been in the middle of a major air defense exercise on September 11, called Vigilant Guardian, which simulated an attack on the United States. [6] Most of the staffers on the NEADS operations floor on the morning of September 11 had no idea what the exercise was going to involve that day, according to the Utica Observer-Dispatch. [7] They could presumably therefore have thought any suspicious reports they received were part of the exercise.

We can see that the August 4 exercise resembled the 9/11 attacks--or at least the official account of the attacks--in several ways. These similarities may have caused NEADS personnel to mistakenly think events on September 11 were part of that day's exercise, since these personnel might have thought they were being tested on a similar scenario.

The first similarity was that while Fertile Rice was based around a scenario in which Osama bin Laden's operatives attacked the United States, the attacks on the U.S. that occurred on September 11 were, according to the official account, ordered by bin Laden and carried out by members of his al-Qaeda terrorist network.

Secondly, the scenario for Fertile Rice and the 9/11 attacks both involved America being attacked from the air. In the exercise, the simulated attack was going to be carried out using an unmanned drone aircraft; on September 11, the attacks were carried out using commercial aircraft.

Thirdly, Fertile Rice and the 9/11 attacks both involved terrorists attacking prominent government buildings in the Washington area. In Fertile Rice, the exact target is unstated. However, the information sheet on the exercise specified that it was a "highly visible U.S. government target" that was likely in the Washington area. [8] This could well have been the Pentagon, the White House, or the Capitol building--three of the most "visible" government buildings in the Washington area.

On September 11, meanwhile, the Pentagon was one of the buildings that were attacked. At 9:37 a.m., according to the official account, American Airlines Flight 77 crashed into its west wall. [9] And it has been claimed that either the White House or the Capitol building was the most likely target for United Airlines Flight 93--the fourth and final plane to be hijacked, which failed to reach its target and supposedly crashed in a field in Pennsylvania. [10]

NEADS RECEIVED NUMEROUS REPORTS OF SUSPICIOUS AIRCRAFT IN THE WASHINGTON AREA ON SEPTEMBER 11
NEADS personnel were alerted to suspicious aircraft that were approaching or over Washington at least four times on the morning of September 11. Since these incidents presumably resembled the scenario they had encountered in Fertile Rice on August 4, we need to consider whether that exercise affected how they evaluated them. For example, did they think the reports of suspicious aircraft were simulated, as part of a scenario like the one they'd encountered in Fertile Rice?

Some, or perhaps all, of the reports NEADS received of suspicious aircraft over or approaching Washington on September 11 might even have been part of the exercise taking place that day. Close analysis of these reports reveals many oddities, which indicate they may indeed have been related to the exercise, rather than to actual events.

FLIGHT 11 WAS REPORTED AS FLYING TOWARD WASHINGTON LONG AFTER IT CRASHED
The first one of these reports came at around 9:21 a.m.--18 minutes after a second plane crashed into the World Trade Center and 16 minutes before the Pentagon was attacked.

Colin Scoggins, the military liaison at the FAA's Boston Air Route Traffic Control Center, incorrectly told NEADS that American Airlines Flight 11--which crashed into the World Trade Center at 8:46 a.m.--was still airborne and was flying south toward Washington. "It was evidently another aircraft that hit the tower," he said. [11]

Scoggins, however, had no solid evidence that Flight 11 was heading for the capital. Air traffic controllers "were never tracking an actual plane on the radar after losing American 11 near Manhattan," Vanity Fair magazine reported. But, "The plane's course, had it continued south past New York in the direction it was flying before it dipped below radar coverage, would have had it headed on a straight course toward DC." [12]

The 9/11 Commission stated that it had "been unable to identify the source of this mistaken FAA information." [13] But according to Vanity Fair, "Colin Scoggins ... made the mistaken call." Scoggins told the magazine he had been monitoring a conference call between FAA centers "when the word came across--from whom or where isn't clear--that American 11 was thought to be headed for Washington." [14]

NEADS WAS ALERTED TO AN AIRCRAFT FLYING AWAY FROM THE WHITE HOUSE
NEADS personnel were alerted to a suspicious aircraft flying over or toward Washington for a second time just before 9:36 a.m., about two minutes before the Pentagon was hit. Again, the source of the information was Colin Scoggins.

Scoggins initially told ID technician Stacia Rountree that the "latest report" was of an aircraft "six miles southeast of the White House" that was "moving away" from the White House. But, seconds later, he said the aircraft was in fact six miles southwest of the White House and "deviating away." Asked if he knew the identity of the aircraft, he replied: "Nothing. ... I have no clue." He suggested that NEADS contact the FAA's Washington Center for more information.

Rountree promptly called the Washington Center and asked about the suspicious aircraft, but the person who answered the call told her: "We don't know anything about that. ... It's probably just a rumor." They were surprised that Scoggins had alerted NEADS to the aircraft, since, they said, Boston Center's "airspace doesn't even come close to [Washington]." "I don't know how they got that information," they added.

Scoggins had told Rountree that Boston Center controllers didn't even have a blip for the suspicious aircraft on their radar screens. Boston Center personnel had just heard about the aircraft over a teleconference and wanted to pass on the information to NEADS, he'd said. [15]

The aircraft was later determined to have been Flight 77--the plane that supposedly crashed into the Pentagon at 9:37 a.m. [16]

NEADS WAS ALERTED TO AN AIRCRAFT FLYING OUT OF CANADA
The third report of a suspicious aircraft approaching or over Washington came at around 10:00 a.m., when a NORAD unit in Canada contacted NEADS and told it an aircraft was heading south from Canada into the United States. [17]

A member of staff at NEADS relayed the details to their colleagues. The aircraft, from an "unknown departure airport," was "heading towards Washington," they said, but nothing else was known about it. [18] Another member of staff at NEADS called the Canadian NORAD unit, seeking more information, but an officer at the unit could provide few details. He said he had seen "something on the chat." (He was presumably referring to NORAD's computer chat system.) The information he'd seen was that his unit's intelligence officers were "assessing that there's a possible aircraft." [19]

The report turned out to be a false alarm. At around 10:10 a.m., the officer at the Canadian NORAD unit called NEADS and said his unit's intelligence officers were "not assessing that there is an actual aircraft problem." It was simply the case that "there could be problems from our area." "There's no actual aircraft that we suspect as being a danger," he added. [20]

A SUSPICIOUS AIRCRAFT WAS REPORTEDLY FLYING OVER THE WHITE HOUSE
The fourth report alerted NEADS personnel to a suspicious aircraft that was supposedly flying over the White House. This report was received at 10:07 a.m.--four minutes after Flight 93, the final aircraft to be hijacked that day, supposedly crashed in Pennsylvania. So by then the terrorist attacks were already over.

A pilot in one of three fighter jets that had taken off from Langley Air Force Base, Virginia, and were flying a combat air patrol over Washington called NEADS. He said a controller at the FAA's Washington Center was "saying something about an aircraft over the White House" and asked if NEADS had any instructions for him. NEADS immediately ordered him to intercept the aircraft and divert it away from the White House.

While the fighters from Langley Air Force Base were heading toward the White House, a member of staff at NEADS suggested to his colleagues that the suspicious aircraft, which was flying "very low," was "probably a helicopter." But a few minutes later, NEADS personnel concluded that the aircraft was in fact one of the fighters from Langley Air Force Base, which the controller at the Washington Center had mistakenly reported because they were unaware fighters had been launched to protect the airspace over Washington. "It was our guys they saw, [Washington] Center saw," a member of staff at NEADS commented. [21]

The evidence that these four reports were part of the exercise NEADS was participating in on September 11--and were presumably related to simulated attacks on Washington--is, of course, inconclusive. The 9:36 a.m. report, for example, may have related to real-world events, when an aircraft involved in the actual attacks was near Washington.

Regardless of the reasons for the reports, though, the fact that Fertile Rice on August 4 included a simulated aerial attack on Washington would surely have increased the likelihood that NEADS personnel would think any reports of suspicious aircraft over or approaching Washington that they received on September 11 were part of the day's exercise.

NEADS PERSONNEL SUGGESTED BIN LADEN WAS RESPONSIBLE FOR THE 9/11 ATTACKS BEFORE ANY BLAME HAD BEEN ATTRIBUTED
Some evidence suggests the Fertile Rice exercise on August 4 did indeed influence the reactions of NEADS personnel to the crisis on September 11. Specifically, the fact that its scenario involved an attack that would be perpetrated by Osama bin Laden and his operatives may have led NEADS personnel to attribute the events of September 11 to bin Laden and Arab terrorists before any official allocation of blame was made.

Even while the terrorist attacks were taking place on the morning of September 11, at least one person at NEADS appears to have concluded that bin Laden was to blame for what was happening. At 9:28 a.m., Sergeant Steve Bianchi told his colleagues, "I think it's time we lost Osama bin Laden." [22] Later on, at 11:11 a.m., someone at NEADS told a colleague, "I think we're getting to the point we ought to start shooting all the ragheads." [23] ("Ragheads" is an offensive term for Muslims, Arabs, or Middle Easterners.)

And yet at these times, NEADS personnel had apparently received no information indicating that bin Laden and his terrorist organization were responsible for the attacks. Transcripts of tape recordings of the NEADS operations floor from the morning of September 11 show no examples of personnel inquiring about who was behind the events they were dealing with or being told who was thought to be responsible for the attacks. [24]

Furthermore, the first report on television firmly indicating that bin Laden and al-Qaeda were responsible appears to have only occurred just after 11:30 a.m. At that time, former NATO commander General Wesley Clark told CNN, "There is only one group that has ever indicated that it has this kind of ability [to carry out such a large-scale coordinated attack] and that's Osama bin Laden's." [25] A clear statement of blame appears to have first been made late that afternoon. At around 4:00 p.m., CNN correspondent David Ensor reported, "U.S. officials are saying that they now have new and specific information ... that people with links to Osama bin Laden may have been responsible for these attacks." [26]

In light of this information, it is worth considering whether NEADS personnel indicated that they thought bin Laden and "the ragheads" were behind the terrorist attacks so early on September 11 because they remembered that bin Laden and his operatives were behind the simulated attack in the Fertile Rice exercise on August 4.

It might also be worth considering whether the exercise NEADS was participating in on September 11 included a scenario, which, like the one in the August 4 exercise, involved an attack on the U.S. perpetrated by bin Laden and his terrorist organization. Even if it didn't, NEADS personnel may have mistakenly thought it did, based on their experiences in the August 4 exercise, in which bin Laden's operatives planned to attack "a highly visible U.S. government target" in the Washington area. The comments "I think it's time we lost Osama bin Laden" and "I think we're getting to the point we ought to start shooting all the ragheads" could therefore have reflected the fact that NEADS personnel thought the incidents they were dealing with on September 11 were part of an exercise scenario based around bin Laden launching an attack in the U.S.

DID THE AUGUST 4 EXERCISE AFFECT HOW NEADS PERSONNEL RESPONDED TO THE EVENTS OF SEPTEMBER 11?
The similarities between the Fertile Rice exercise that NEADS personnel participated in on August 4, 2001, and the 9/11 attacks, five and a half weeks later, give rise to important questions.

For example, were the similarities just a coincidence or were they the result of something more sinister? Might the exercise have been intended to, in some way, impair the ability of NEADS personnel to stop the 9/11 attacks? If so, this would indicate that rogue individuals in the U.S. military were involved with planning the 9/11 attacks and designed the August 4 exercise to increase the likelihood of the attacks being successfully carried out.

We can certainly see several goals the exercise may have achieved toward facilitating the 9/11 attacks. To begin with, since it involved a hostile aircraft aiming for a target in Washington, Fertile Rice could have increased the likelihood that NEADS personnel would think any reports they received of suspicious aircraft approaching Washington or in the Washington area on September 11 were part of that day's exercise, rather than being attempts to alert them to real events. And if they thought any of the incidents they had to deal with on September 11 were simulated, NEADS personnel may have responded to them differently than if they knew they were real. They may, for example, have reacted with less urgency.

Secondly, the exercise could have helped convince NEADS personnel that Osama bin Laden and his terrorist organization were capable of carrying out sophisticated attacks in the United States. Fertile Rice involved bin Laden organizing an elaborate and audacious aerial attack on a government building in Washington--an area that should have been particularly well protected. This may have led NEADS personnel to believe it had been determined that bin Laden was capable of carrying out highly sophisticated attacks in the U.S.

If they believed this, they would presumably have been more likely to accept the official explanation of who was behind the 9/11 attacks and less likely to raise questions about the validity of this explanation. They would therefore have been less likely to wonder if a rogue group within the U.S. military and other government agencies was responsible for the attacks.

NEADS personnel received a briefing in July 2001 that may have been intended to fulfill the same purpose--convincing them that bin Laden was capable of carrying out an aerial attack in the U.S. Lieutenant Colonel Mark Stuart, an intelligence officer at NEADS, told the 9/11 Commission that "the last Osama bin Laden [Continental United States NORAD Region] threat briefing" before 9/11 was on July 14, "as part of the increased threat warning during summer 2001." The increased threat level "was briefed at NEADS," he said. [27] Since the briefing was given to personnel whose job was to defend the airspace over North America, it presumably warned about the possibility of bin Laden specifically carrying out an aerial attack in the U.S.

DID OTHER EXERCISES HAVE SIMILARITIES WITH THE 9/11 ATTACKS?
The details that are available about the Fertile Rice exercise held at NEADS on August 4, 2001, give rise to many questions. For example, did the similarities between the scenario around which Fertile Rice was based and some of the incidents they encountered on September 11 lead NEADS personnel to think these incidents were part of the Vigilant Guardian exercise taking place that day? Also, who came up with the scenario for the August 4 exercise and who was responsible for preparing the exercise?

Fertile Rice exercises were held weekly at NEADS, so numerous scenarios must have been included in them in the months leading up to 9/11 besides the one in the August 4 exercise. What were these scenarios and did any of them resemble the 9/11 attacks? Master Sergeant Joe McCain, the mission crew commander technician at NEADS, indicated that Fertile Rice exercises prior to September 11 had at least some similarities to the 9/11 attacks. He said they included simulated hijackings, although only one plane would be hijacked in the scenarios. Occasionally, he said, the aircraft hijacked in the simulation had taken off from within the United States--like the four planes that were hijacked on September 11. [28] So did their participation in these exercises lead NEADS personnel to think the hijackings on September 11 were part of that day's exercise?

Additionally, did NEADS conduct any other exercises in the months leading up to September 11, besides its Fertile Rice exercises, that were based around scenarios resembling the 9/11 attacks? It regularly held exercises called Fertile Spade, Fertile Angel, and Fertile Gain. [29] What scenarios did these exercises involve in the months before 9/11? If any of the scenarios resembled the 9/11 attacks, did this cause NEADS personnel to mistake events on September 11 for part of an exercise?

Furthermore, were any of the reports of suspicious aircraft approaching or over Washington that NEADS received on September 11 part of an exercise, such as Vigilant Guardian? If so, this would mean the exercise was allowed to continue after the second hijacked plane crashed into the World Trade Center--at 9:03 a.m.--and it became obvious that the U.S. was under attack. The exercise may in fact have still been going on at 10:07 a.m., when NEADS was alerted to a supposedly suspicious aircraft flying over the White House. If the exercise did indeed continue even though the U.S. was clearly under attack, why was this? Whose job should it have been to cancel it?

A new investigation of 9/11 is necessary to address questions like these. Investigators would need to have access to all relevant documents, and individuals who worked at NEADS on September 11 and in the months before then would need to be able to speak freely about their experiences. Examination of military training exercises and their possible connections to what happened on September 11 may reveal a lot of important information about the 9/11 attacks and who was responsible for them.

According to historycommons, they then learn of the Pentagon attack "and Bush’s Secret Service agents instruct them to go to the basement of the building they are in." In a slight variation of this story, "Bush and her entourage then reach Gregg’s office, where they will remain until the Secret Service takes them away to a “secure location” at around 10:10 a.m." - which is not the PEOC: "Bush’s Secret Service agents say they are going to take everyone to a secure location. This turns out to be the Secret Service headquarters in Washington". "The Secret Service headquarters, according to journalist and author Ronald Kessler, is “an anonymous nine-story tan brick building on H Street at Ninth Street NW in Washington.” It is located a few blocks from the White House. After the Oklahoma City bombing in 1995 it was reinforced to survive a large-scale blast. Bush and her entourage arrive there through an underground entrance."
Much later, around 6:30, "Laura Bush, the president’s wife, is driven, by members of the Secret Service, to the White House from the Secret Service headquarters in Washington, DC, and is then escorted down to the Presidential Emergency Operations Center (PEOC) below the White House."http://historycommons.org/entity.jsp?entity=laura_bush_1

According to historycommons, Lynne Cheney, who was at a hair salon when the two planes crashed in NYC, was first driven towards "the vice president’s residence, which is on the grounds of the US Naval Observatory in northwest Washington" in response to the USSS receiving word of an approaching plane (ca. 9:34). When they learn during the drive that the Pentagon had been attacked, the car turns around. "The colleague says that since Cheney’s motorcade is “on 15th Street and near the White House,” it should change destination and take Cheney to “the White House shelter” where she can join her husband. ... [Mrs. Cheney] will comment that after the Pentagon has been hit, the Secret Service “decided that maybe it would be safer for me to be underneath the White House. The immediate threat was gone, so they took me there.”"

Jennings says at 9:41 and a few seconds: "there is a plane cicling the White House at the moment, and they're clearing the grounds there". I think this refers to AA77 which had been circling near Washington a few minutes earlier. The only other plane that came close to DC in that general timeframe was, as you no doubt know, Gopher06 - the C130 that had departed ADW a little earlier and had been vectored to check out AA77. Check out radar: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lMWbHAqRHvI

The 9/11 Commission Staff wrote this note of their interview with Garabito (page 10): "Recalls 3 separate group of info reported by FAA prior to crash: (1) two unaccounted for planes, possibly hijacked, in addition to those that crashed into WTC; (2) one of the unaccounted for planes was heading to DC; (3) the unaccounted for airplane toward DC was 30 miles out and coming in fast and low".

This information is of course inaccurate - whether inaccurately recalled by Garabito, or inaccurately paraphrased by Staff, or inaccurately related to Garabito by FAA (van Steenbergen)

However, note that this version has only ONE plane headed for DC, most likely either AA77 or the ghost AA11. When AA77 had crashed, there was no more plane headed to DC that Garabito knew of.

The film was made after the 9/11 Commission Report was published in July 2004. Do you know when? What program was this aired on? Anyway, I suggest that Garabito's recollection had "evolved" since his Staff interview, which was on or before July 28 2003 (see date on top of the pages which habe the Garabito statements).

Are you suggesting the White House shelter is an unsafe location when someone is attacking the White House? Why then does it exist?

Are you suggesting the White House shelter is an unsafe location when someone is attacking the White House? Why then does it exist?

No. There is no way of knowing how safe that place is. But the grounds surrounding and leading up to the WH are not hardened. A plane could have surprised that zone at any time while they transported the first ladies to the PEOC.

What it indicates to me is they had good information about any real threats to the WH area. If they thought there was a chance of incoming, they would've sent Lynne and Laura elsewhere. Are these high value assets under the care of protective services or what?

mikealfaromeao wrote: Jennings says at 9:41 and a few seconds: "there is a plane cicling the White House at the moment, and they're clearing the grounds there". I think this refers to AA77 which had been circling near Washington a few minutes earlier. The only other plane that came close to DC in that general timeframe was, as you no doubt know, Gopher06 - the C130 that had departed ADW a little earlier and had been vectored to check out AA77.

Answer: Now come on, sir! You are not suggesting that the AA77 target or the GOPHER06 target could have been mistaken for "over the White House" are you? Neither were anywhere near the WH. If you are suggesting this, then any craft leaving ADW at the time could be mistaken. What about WORD31 or VENUS22?. Shall we add them to this fouled up mess?

Over P-56 is the qualifier. Do we have a plane that fits this description or not?

"No. There is no way of knowing how safe that place is."
Can we agree that it is likely the safest place on and around the White House Premises, and it is a good idea to go to an underground shelter in case someone want to drop an airplane at you - or otherwise kill you?

Some say the shelter is built to survive a nuclear hit - I doubt that, but it's built as a bunker from the outset, so you must be in willful denial if you want to doubt that the PEOC is a pretty safe place.

"But the grounds surrounding and leading up to the WH are not hardened. A plane could have surprised that zone at any time while they transported the first ladies to the PEOC."

I already corrected your claim that the First Lady, Laura Bush, was taken to the PEOC in the morning. Please read my earlier comments.

So it's too bad that you can hit high-value targets while they are not in a shelter. That is, in my insignificant opinion no good reason not to relocate to a shelter. A sniper could be positioned at the VP's residence, a car bomb placed along the route - how are you going to rule out all the ways that terrorists could attack the First Ladies? There was no honor code in place to only use airplanes to kill anyone!

"What it indicates to me is they had good information about any real threats to the WH area. If they thought there was a chance of incoming, they would've sent Lynne and Laura elsewhere. Are these high value assets under the care of protective services or what?"
Again: Scratch Laura from that story! She wasn't brought to the White House until the evening!

You present fascinating insight to the inner workings of your brain, but no professional personal detail ought to be obliged to abide by protocols that you imagine to be better than theirs.

"Now come on, sir! You are not suggesting that the AA77 target or the GOPHER06 target could have been mistaken for "over the White House" are you?"

Two possibilities that I can think of immediately:

1. You saw Venus 77 turning over DC, did you not? It was outside of P56 at all times. How sure are you that observers on the ground near the WH would not later say that V77 "circled over the WH"? People tend to misjudge angles from zenith, and underestimate distances to objects in the sky. I think it's plausible that Gopher was visible from downtown DC

2. Jennings is merely imprecisely paraphrasing a piece of information he was given earlier - say, a report of a plane that was "heading toward the WH", then "circled", can easily become a plane that "circled the WH".

I personally think #2 is the more plausible explanation and that neither Gopher nor any other plane after AA77 caused the mix-up. But that's just me.

The important point for you is: Look at the radar recording - there wasn't any plane at all that actually flew or circled "over" the WH!

"Over P-56 is the qualifier. Do we have a plane that fits this description or not?"

No, we do not. Peter Jennings was somewhat mistaken when he claimed "there is a plane cicling the White House at the moment". The smart thing for you would be to accept that his statement is contradicted by the evidence, and thus reject the statement, at least a literal reading of it. Just as with Mineta: He is proven wrong, so the smart choice is to let go of his false statements.

"Cheney’s driver takes the car over the curb and onto the sidewalk, to try and get Cheney to the White House, but a fire engine is driven in front of the car, to block its path. Eventually, though, Cheney’s car is allowed onto the grounds. "

"...I arrived just as the White House was being evacuated. So the guards had no idea who we wereand were confused that somebody would want to be coming in,and wouldn't lower the barriers. The Secret Service peoplewho were with me drove onto the sidewalk. And at that point, a fire engine tried to block our way ... going into the White House. But I finally got in, was taken downstairs -- and as I say,everybody else was leaving the White House at this point -- lower and lower into the White House, and came across Dick, who was already underground. And when I got there, he was on the phone with the President. He was on the phone with the President many times that day. But from that first place where I ran into him, I moved with him into what they call the PEOC ..."

Mrs. Cheney talks in more detail about where and how they were and went before getting to the White House, and her estimate of the arrival time ("It was probably close to10:00 a.m.") is off by about 15 minutes. She seems confident that the USSS started to move her only after the Pentagon was struck, which she places at 9:40, and that they then went towards the VP's residence for 5 mimutes before makimg a U-turn and heading back. That's how she arrived at 10 am.

She is probably mistaken about the start time (5 minutes earlier), and probably mistaken about how long they drove the other direction (should have been under 5 minutes) - which highlights the inaccuracy of witness recollection when it comes to remembering and estimating times.

She claims to have taken notes on a yellow notebook, in chronological order. This can be corroborated:

Cheney might have used a phone in the tunnel. So what? It doesn't mean it was the first time, or that he hadn't already gone to the EBR/PEOC earlier then returned to the tunnel. They were having communications issues. Maybe the only working line to W was in the tunnel.

Just because Lynne arrives at a certain time doesn't mean Dick didn't arrive earlier.

If I were in charge of security I would make sure times were stated as later than actual, so foreign intelligence operatives could not accurately reconstruct protocols. Apparently Mineta didn't get the memo and testified truthfully. His testimony was not used in the 911 Commission report.

I'm still digging up information to figure out what the heck happened.

"Cheney might have used a phone in the tunnel. So what?"
Yes, so what? I have no idea why you bring that up.

"It doesn't mean it was the first time, or that he hadn't already gone to the EBR/PEOC earlier then returned to the tunnel. They were having communications issues. Maybe the only working line to W was in the tunnel."
Sure. Perhaps they had ordered pizza to the PEOC after the hookers left the orgy with Ted Kennedy earlier in the PEOC, and maybe the video conference had porn on two channels.
Everyone can make up claims and stuff.

"Just because Lynne arrives at a certain time doesn't mean Dick didn't arrive earlier."
Corrrrrrrect! When Lynne arrives, Dick is already there, so he definitely arrived "earlier". But he was stil in his office and not yet grabbed by his personal detail at precisely 09:36:43. This means Dick arrived in the tunnel not earlier, but possibly later, than 9:38. He arrived before Lynne of course, that would be before 9:50, 9:52 or thereabouts.

"If I were in charge of security I would make sure times were stated as later than actual"
This is fascinating insight into the workings of your brain, but since you have precisely zero training and experience with such operations, this tells us precisely nothing about what happened on 9/11 at the White House. We all can make up stuff and tell stories about how we would rule the world. I enjoy that sometimes myself.

"Apparently Mineta didn't get the memo and testified truthfully. His testimony was not used in the 911 Commission report."
His testimony is wrong. Nothing could be clearer than this. He is mistaken, or lies.
Mineta entered the PEOC after Rice, Rice (with Truscott) entered the shelter after Lynne (with Libby). In fact, I don't think Mineta ever mentioned the tunnel, he apparently goes straight to the conference room. In fact, we have a photo of him entering the PEOC - the photo was taken after 10:03 and before 10:18.

"I'm still digging up information to figure out what the heck happened."
You desperately wish you could retroactively change reality such that it fits your wrong conclusion that Mineta was right about the timeline and everybody else was wrong. You need to let go!

Detecting modifications is a whole field of science and nothing like the movies. Releasing images of this quality makes editing them extremely difficult. You can suggest anything is fake, it's a common theme in some circles, but without evidence (in this case, math) there's no reason to take the suggestion as anything other than that.

Mineta was testifying in May 2003. No way he can remember all the fine details. But he damn sure will recall those details that he was personally involved in, like talking to Belger, ordering the ground stop at 9:45 and seeing people evacuating the WH.

There were two evacuations. One walking (9:20), one running (9:45).

The White House begins slowly evacuating around this time, according to some accounts. In a 9:52 a.m. report, CNN White House correspondent John King will state that “about 30 minutes ago,” the White House had begun “slowly evacuating.” [CNN, 9/11/2001] White House pastry chef Roland Mesnier will write in his 2006 memoirs that the evacuation begins at “exactly 9:18.” At this time, Secret Service agents tell Mesnier to “go out, right now,” because, Mesnier is told, “a plane was targeting the White House and would be there soon.” [Mesnier and Malard, 2006, pp. 361] The evacuation proceeds in an orderly fashion. But later on, around 9:45 a.m., those evacuating will be ordered to run (see (9:45 a.m.) September 11, 2001). [CNN, 9/11/2001]
Source: http://www.historycommons.org/context.jsp?item=a945whitehouseevacuation

"Mineta was testifying in May 2003. No way he can remember all the fine details. But he damn sure will recall those details that he was personally involved in, like talking to Belger, ordering the ground stop at 9:45 and seeing people evacuating the WH."

You keep saying Mineta ordered all planes to land at 9:45 based on Belger's 9/11 commission MFR that has "(around 9:45)" written in the notes, you also have access to audio of Belger's interview with the 9/11 commission staffers. Here's your chance to post the audio of Belger saying that Mineta ordered ATC zero at 9:45 and prove that it wasn't a commission staffer making a note of what time ATC zero happened independent of any prompting from Belger.

Here's what Belger and Sliney said to the 9/11 commission:

"MR. GORTON: Okay. Let me go on to you, Mr. Sliney, with a few questions. When you on your first day on the job made two decisions on 9/11, that at one level at least weren't yours to make, did you not? First, that no one should take off; and, second, we should take all civilian aircraft out of the air. Is that not correct?

MR. SLINEY: That is correct.

......

MR. GORTON: It wasn't the formal protocol for Mr. Sliney to have gotten headquarters permission before he put in these ground stops?

MR. BELGER: I don't agree with that personally. I think -- I agree with Mr. Sliney completely. I think they had the authority to make that decision. I think they made the right call."